This week I have started to find my feet. Through uni I have tried many new study techniques and ways to keep up to date and try to load the overload of information we are given into my head. Along with my uni I had a bit of different training on Thursday rather than what has seemed like a continuous streak of hill sessions. I was lucky enough to have the track and field nationals being held just down the road from my hall at the Caledonian track where I qualified to race the 5000m event.
This was originally planned to be raced on the Friday but due to 9 competitors in the under 20 age bracket they decided to combine us with the similar amount of senior women the day earlier on the Thursday arvo. This actually ended up being a blessing as Friday’s weather was much colder and rainy.
For the Thursday the day was perfect and I was going into the race with the potential to gain a PB as my qualifying time was the 5km split in my 10km I did a few weeks prior, so if I could keep running for 5km after with a PB I could definitely get one without that extra distance.
I will always prefer morning races as someone who loves to train in the morning but when it comes to track that doesn’t tend to work in my favour so with a 4.20pm I still had the whole day prior to set me up.
It started with a easy shake out 30 minute run in the morning followed by a normal day of uni until 12 where I then headed back to have lunch and get myself ready and down to the track. It’s strange not having a community that I know everyone anymore as I’m so used to my home community all being so close and always having family to support me.
Luckily a group of the returners of my hall all came along and watched which made me feel more settled and into the race as-well as the head coach of the Leith Athletics Club I joined down here cheering me on as well.
An advantage of knowing the area is knowing the areas to warm up so that wasn’t an issue. Nationals is much on a differently level when it comes to how the race is organised and there was multiple prep steps I had to do like drug testing learning modules and entering my race shoes. Getting to the start I made myself reflect on how proud I should be of myself for qualifying and getting to this point as just over a year ago I was getting more competitive and wanting to break 20 minutes in the 5km, and it can be really easy to overlook and just be in the moment. So knowing even if I didn’t get that PB I should be happy with myself.
When the gun went off just as I expected the race was slow, as track racing is always so different to how people race off of the track and especially in half marathons. Knowing how I run I know I can’t start too slow, I like to push the pace even though I know I’m not going to beat them in the end, and surely enough at 800m the senior women started to kick and I knew thats when I needed to feel myself in the race and not worry about them.
Surprisingly, there was one senior women who was not too far ahead of me and throughout the race I had to goal and incentive to slowly work towards her to keep my pace, and thats the thing as we couldn’t wear watches so I had no clue on where I was pacing wise towards my PB.
One key aspect I made sure I work with is to keep telling myself too push and not fall off my pace, so I would tell myself its not killing me so push harder so thats what I would do.
Entering the final kilometre I was pushing hard and it began to become very mental and thats somewhere I am still needing to work on but I could already see my improvement to how I was in my previous races.
Crossing the line felt amazing but the knowledge of my times was unknown as the clock finishes on the first finisher, and I can tell you now these senior women can move. I felt like I pushed myself and the muscles in my legs started to tell me that too with them suddenly being in pain and walking never felt so painful.
When I finally managed to grab my phone to look at the online results thats when I saw my time and a wave of accomplishment ran over me. 18:30 was the offical time and that was more than I could have expected.
I pushed the effort and I got the rewards which makes me positive for my future racings and what I can achieve in my key races in the further distances. So I guess I’ll keep working and see what I can just achieve in 4 weeks in Christchurch in the 10km 
– Jessica Bray